I know that lots of hunters either throw away the hide, let the processor keep it, or chunk it up and give it away as fly tying material, but those aren't always the best uses for it.

If you shoot a deer and aren't going to do anything with the hide, I'll take it off of your hands and in exchange, I will tan it and you make you something in fair trade out of it. Something along the lines of a pair of moccasins, satchel or bag of some sort, or if you'd like, maybe just some nice, long pieces of tanned leather laces/strips for use in other crafts. (you woodworkers can cane your canoe seats with strips of hide - the rest of you can use it as rugged boot laces.)

In short, I can try'n make just about anything you'd like out of the hide itself or we could work something else out(flies, duck feathers, birch or pine gathering baskets, etc), but considering the amount of work that goes into tanning and smoking a hide, I'd plan on keeping a most of it for personal use. If interested, I can put some pictures together of various crafts and projects I've done.

Hope you've all had a good season... Still waiting for that push of northern birds.

Kudos to you for utilizing that! I can tell you a lot of it gets wasted every year here locally...most folks (myself included) have never tanned or worked with it (other than fly tying) and frankly, don't bother. I'd love to see some pics of your work on here- shoot some images up if you want!

I've given away or traded most of my birch baskets but I just sent out an email nagging those who have 'em for a few pictures.

I don't have any pictures of leather goods except for one pair of moccasins that need to be re-tanned at the moment. (unless smoked, the leather really doesn't like to get wet or the tanning agents get washed out and the leather becomes more like raw hide again - not very comfortable!)

Here's one picture. I don't know why but I have one hell of a time trying to upload pictures to DHC... And I'm a member of the iPhone generation.

Bummer man, I shot two last weekend (good day in the expanded zone)...wish I had known, I just may get another and will give a shout if I do. Hate wasting but already got a few hanging around without the craftyness to make them something cool.